From Tragedy to Triumph: Roy and Lula Jones - an Uncommon Family

ISBN-10: 0692310932
ISBN-13: 9780692310939
Series: From Tragedy to Triumph
Pages: 335
Language: English
Published: 2014-12-17
Authors: Elizabeth Jones Hostetter, Karen Hostetter Kilpatrick

Description

Elizabeth Jones Hostetter, granddaughter of Roy and Lula Talbert Jones, realized long after their deaths, that she was part of an uncommon family. She spent years in research, piecing together the history of their lives from her grandmother's diary, saved letters, books, and small fragments written on scrap paper, to broader searches at libraries, newspapers, and Alabama archives. She has formed a compelling story of a couple who not only survived great tragedies, when they could easily have been defeated, but rather rose above their circumstances and instilled in their seven children the virtues that build lives of contentment, success, and significance. Lula was only thirteen when her mother was murdered in 1906 at their home in Lucedale, Mississippi. In the same year, Roy experienced the tragic deaths of his father and brother, who drowned while working on their oyster boats near Mobile Bay during a hurricane. The same night, their house in Alabama Port collapsed and they lost everything. This young man and woman's families moved to Mobile to start over. Here they met, fell in love, married, and had their first child. From that tragic beginning developed a strong family who migrated to the coal fields of West Virginia and later to Bristol, Tennessee, where Roy worked as a railroad machinist. Lula's diary documents the service of three of their four sons during World War II, as well as their daily family life. It became a major document for telling their history. Their other son was born with developmental disabilities. 2015 celebrates what would be Roy and Lula's 100th wedding anniversary and is the 90th birthday of their special son, William. The author traces the deep Christian faith and phenomenal love Roy and Lula had for their family and extended family, which have helped shape the values the family holds as they now help care for their special uncle.